Facebook tests way into China via secret photo-sharing app

A photo-sharing app has appeared on Apple's App Store in China that looks exactly like Facebook's Moments app, and analysts say it may be a way for the US tech group to finally break into its most coveted market.

"Facebook have been trying under-the-radar stuff in China," said Shaun Rein, managing director of China Market Research Group. "It seems like [Colourful Balloons] could be a clandestine attempt by Facebook to re-enter China."

Mr Rein said Facebook has tried to develop and launch made-in-China apps before.

Facebook has no problem with Colourful Balloons’ seeming infringement of Facebook’s intellectual property. A Facebook spokesperson was asked to comment on the apps’ similarities and spoke only in positive terms.

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“We have long said that we are interested in China, and are spending time understanding and learning more about the country in different ways,” said the spokesperson.

Signals

Analysts say the arrival of the Colourful Balloons app signals Facebook is looking into ways of re-entering China.

"One possibility is that Facebook is testing the water with this product in China," said Qu Kai, founder of Beijing Forty-Two Chapters, a tech investment research service. "Another possibility is that this is not about the product, but about feeling out relations with the government."

The American social-media group has been blocked by China's Great Firewall censorship regime since 2009 in the wake of riots in the Xinjiang region, when separatist activists used the network to communicate.

Facebook is familiar with the group behind Colourful Balloons: their executives attended at least one Shanghai government meeting together.

- (Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2017)